Let us glance at the other side of the Christian’s work. If it is our privilege to be continually praising and blessing God, it is also our privilege to be doing good to man. “But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.” We are passing through a world of misery, of sin and death and sorrow. We are surrounded by broken hearts and crushed spirits. We need to look for them.
Yes, we need to look for them. It is easy for us to close our eyes to such things, to turn away from — to “forget” — that there are such things always within reach of us. We can sit in our easy chair, and speculate about truth, doctrines and the letter of Scripture; we can discuss the theories of Christianity and the fine points of prophecy and dispensational truth, and, all the while, be shamefully failing in the discharge of our grand responsibility as Christians. We are in imminent danger of forgetting that Christianity is a living reality. It is not a set of dogmas, a number of principles strung together on a thread of systematized divinity, which unconverted people can have at their fingertips. Neither is it a set of ordinances to be gone through, in dreary formality, by lifeless, heartless professors. No; it is life — life eternal — life implanted by the Holy Spirit, and expressing itself in those two lovely forms on which we have been dwelling, namely, praise to God and doing good to man. Such was the life of Jesus when He walked on this earth. He lived in the atmosphere of praise, and He went about doing good.
After He is our life, He is our model on which the life is to be formed. The Christian should be the living expression of Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit. It is not a mere question of leading what is called a religious life, which very often resolves itself into a tiresome round of duties which neither yield “praise” to God nor one atom of “good” to man. There must be life, or it is all perfectly worthless. “The kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God, and approved of men.” Romans 14:17,1817For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. 18For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God, and approved of men. (Romans 14:17‑18).
In this connection, it is profitable to compare Hebrews 13:1316 with 1 Peter 2:49. “Let us go forth therefore unto Him,” says Paul. “To whom coming,” says Peter. Then, in Peter, we have the “holy priesthood” offering up spiritual sacrifices of praise, and the “royal priesthood” doing good and communicating — showing “forth the praises [virtues] of Him who hath called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” These two scriptures give us a magnificent view of fundamental, devotional and practical Christianity.
Let us earnestly apply our hearts to consider these great practical truths. Let us seek to be Christians not merely in name but in reality. Let us not be distinguished as mere vendors of peculiar “views.” Oh! how worthless are views! How utterly profitless is discussion! How wearisome are theological hair-splittings! Let us have life, light and love. These are heavenly, eternal, divine. All else is vanity. How we do long for reality in this world of sham — for deep thinkers and earnest workers in this day of shallow talkers!